Café de Leche

The direct trade here comes with dates attached — the Duromina co-op in Ethiopia, roasted since 2018, bought direct since 2019, the farm visited in person early that year — and dates are what separate a sourcing story from a slogan. Nothing manual appears on the drink list; the argument gets made in Latin instead, through a horchata con espresso and a piloncillo latte campesino.

• The horchata con espresso
• A neighborhood morning
• Bringing kids along
• A long sit by the windows

The coffee is roasted here in Highland Park, with a direct-trade relationship to the Duromina co-op in Ethiopia since 2019, and seven retail coffees each carry region, washing station or producer, process, and roast level, a Masha from Kayanza in Burundi among them. No varietal and no roast date appears on any of them, so the transparency is real but stops short of the shelf.

FreelandBuck drew this corner building in 2008 as a public hub for Highland Park, setting the counter and partition walls at a subtle angle so views into and out of the room stretch and foreshorten. An image of the San Fernando mountains runs the length of the long wall — architecture doing the work most coffee bars leave to a chalkboard.